Fresh on the scene and he’s already taken the fashion and hip hop worlds by storm! Pulling from a multimedia and performance art background, Zebra Katz brings a slo-mo dark delivery to his rhymes, which are set over a minimal, unencumbered beat on his highly acclaimed first single “IMA READ” (Mad Decent/Jeffrrees). “IMA READ” was heralded as the “Official Song of Paris Fashion Week” after Rick Owens personally chose it to score his Fall/Winter Womenswear runway show. Since its release three months ago, the hauntingly sexy video has been viewed on YouTube a half a million times (as of May 1 2012) and ZK has been featured in the NYTimes’ New Music and Fashion and Style sections, Pitchfork, Vogue, Interview Magazine, and myriad other magazines and blogs.

Zebra Katz is capstone creation of 25 year old New York multidisciplinary artist Ojay Morgan. Inspired by Nina Simone, Andre 3000, Missy Elliot, James Blake, and Lauryn Hill. Morgan has cultivated a signature and unique presence all his own. Having shared the stage with artists from Diplo to The Scissor Sisters and Big Freedia. His lives shows are not to be missed, his memorable SXSW set in Austin was covered by Rolling Stone.SICK GIRLS

The Sick Girls DJ team started out in 2004, playing all the stuff that they could not hear anywhere else in Techno-Berlin at the time.
Just to have something to dance to. And it worked out better than they thought…

Nowadays they play gigs all around the world and can look proudly at their successful party series Revolution N°5 which introduced a new club sound to the city that is now overall established.

They brought acts like Spankrock, Radioclit, Virus Syndicate or Mumdance to Berlin for the first time and played alongside most of their favorite artists like Dizzee Rascal, M.I.A., Roll Deep, Buraka Som Sistema, DJ/Rupture, The Bug, Wiley, TTC, Telepathe, Modeselektor or Shaggy (omg!).

We came to Bass…

URBAN MUTATIONS

DJ MFK & DJ SWADANSI (b2b)

Urban Mutations is a HOT new DJ duo in Berlin. They play an endless b2b stream of HOT multi-faceted beat shit ranging from TRAP to JERSEY CLUB to JUKE to UK BASS to the newest Soundcloud treasures. They keep the dance floor alive and in full-reactive mode at all times, BITCH.

UK Bass / Cali Beats / Jersey Club / Juke / Mutated R&B

SARAH FARINA

After quietly preparing her ammunition in 2011, Sarah Farina is quickly invading all corners of the Berlin Club Land in 2012. Understanding the power of surprise, she took many dancefloors by storm by dropping an arsenal of Bass Bombs, Trap Shit Boogable Bangers with millitary precision. Showing no signs of retreat, the Rookie of WEBOOGIE continiuous to take a serious shot at the title of Rookie of the Year, supporting the biggest names and being the fresh new resident of several of the city’s most respected venues.

Kwes – may be more familiar than you realise, the 24 year old musical multitasker has worked with artists including The xx, The Invisible, Micachu and Joe Goddard.

Urban Mutations – Concentrating on UK Bass music from labels such as Night Slugs, and Swamp 81 and mixing it with hot new American sounds coming from labels such as Fade to Mind and Body High they create an exciting and very danceable patchwork of the freshest club music of the present.

Micachu
]]>http://playberlin.com/2012/07/micachu-urban-mutations/feed/0Group Doueh & Awesome Tapes from Africahttp://playberlin.com/2012/07/group-doueh-awesome-tapes-from-africa/
http://playberlin.com/2012/07/group-doueh-awesome-tapes-from-africa/#commentsTue, 31 Jul 2012 20:58:25 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6236Group Doueh – from Dakhla in the Western Sahara, are a band who morph effortlessly, just like the vital and heavy sandblasted music they make. Their live set-up can switch from soaring and hypnotic rocking and rolling guitar songs with huge choruses to meditative and transcendental acoustic folk tracks. The group’s ancient/modern is rooted in the traditional foundations of Sahrawi/Hassania music, but one that is also entirely its own.

Awesome Tapes from Africa – After a stint in Ghana researching the local hip-hop movement, Brooklyn’s Brian Shimkovitz, a trained ethnomusicologist, has accumulated hundreds of cassette tapes of rare african music from Zimbabwe to Ethiopia to Senegal. He has been sharing his bounty through his popular blog Awesome Tapes From Africa, which he takes on the road as a DJ.

DJ SCOTCH BONNET (aka DJ Scotch Egg/ JAP)Swapping GameBoys and 8-bit limitation for a hefty distortion unit, Ishihara delves deep into the world of bass-driven hip-hop breaks, melding dense distorted beats with his signature pop sensibility and references Scorn, NHK, and the dance music culture of his new home-town, Berlin.

Looking for hot topics and sable sounds? #gHashtag is Berlin’s cross-genre/cross-dressing URL/IRL connection. The only party in town where you can hear Concrete Blonde and Brenmar, SPK and TLC all in the same night. Come get tilted on SALEM and White Ring, then get thrown by Nguzungzuzu. Get tagged in the F.O.G. with us. It’ll be black magick.

23h // 6€
Sameheads, Richardstr. 10
U7 Karl-Marx Str.

LINEUP

]]>http://playberlin.com/2012/03/ghashtag-sameheads/feed/0Magic Movement #2: 360° Performancehttp://playberlin.com/2012/02/magic-movement-2-360%c2%b0-performance/
http://playberlin.com/2012/02/magic-movement-2-360%c2%b0-performance/#commentsWed, 08 Feb 2012 13:34:14 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6168We invited many different people to present their short performance interventions during the course of the evening.

The Magic Movement is about creating the possibilities, exploring the opportunities, and doing the things you can’t do to have fun with them.

Every guest will get a program of the evening where the events are scheduled every 15 minutes. They will all be happening around us and some of them can be even performed by you yourself.

It’s going to all be movement as a reaction, no second-thought, no remorse, pure action.

Thank you to all the 780 people who came to see Reggie Watts, supported by Polysingularity and DJ SWADANSI and Masterfader on Sunday. Special thanks to Simon Wojan from Festsaal Kreuzberg. Photos by Miguel Lopes.

DJ INCOGNEGRO with musical selections that include but are not limited to trippy-troppy hippidy-hoppidy trance-tastic, classic tuneage that may cause euphoria, dizziness, convulsions, and transcendental behavior……

]]>http://playberlin.com/2012/01/an-kaler-insignificant-other/feed/0Balam Acab + Holy Other + oOoOO + Kuedohttp://playberlin.com/2012/01/balam-acab-holy-other-ooooo-kuedo/
http://playberlin.com/2012/01/balam-acab-holy-other-ooooo-kuedo/#commentsThu, 05 Jan 2012 11:55:53 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6044Holy OtherBalam Acab
]]>http://playberlin.com/2012/01/balam-acab-holy-other-ooooo-kuedo/feed/0Hudson Mohawke and Anstam at CTM.12http://playberlin.com/2012/01/hudson-mohawke-and-anstam-at-ctm-12/
http://playberlin.com/2012/01/hudson-mohawke-and-anstam-at-ctm-12/#commentsThu, 05 Jan 2012 11:44:05 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6042HudsonAnstam
]]>http://playberlin.com/2012/01/hudson-mohawke-and-anstam-at-ctm-12/feed/0REGGIE WATTS LIVE IN BERLINhttp://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts-live-in-berlin/
http://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts-live-in-berlin/#commentsThu, 29 Dec 2011 22:52:12 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6031Imagine you come to a show and realize midway through that you’re having a really strong trip. Reggie Watts’ intellectually stimulating hilariously clever improvised comedy beatbox performance does exactly this to the audiences. On the 29th of January 2012 PLAYBerlin is bringing Reggie to Berlin to play at Festsaal Kreuzberg live. Save the date in your calendars and buy the tickets before they’re sold out!

]]>http://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts-live-in-berlin/feed/0Reggie Watts in Berlinhttp://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts-in-berlin/
http://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts-in-berlin/#commentsThu, 29 Dec 2011 22:42:42 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6024Imagine you come to a show and realize midway through that you’re having a really strong trip. Reggie Watts’ intellectually stimulating hilariously clever improvised comedy beatbox performance does exactly this to the audiences. Buy the tickets for the show now before they’re sold out!

In his stream-of-consciousness monologues combined with beautifully mastered beatbox interludes, Reggie shifts seamlessly between different personas, musical styles, accents, voices, and even – yes – bodies. He may be speaking in British cockney to explain how many Xanax he has taken, or as a ghetto youth with extensive knowledge of economic theory (“this world be fucking crazy, when you be looking at some virtualized numbers that symbolize shit that don’t exist”). Whoever witnesses this hilarious psychotic maze, goes through a succession of mental orgasms accompanied by endless fits of laughter.

Hailed as the “man of towering genius” by Brian Eno and the “comic genius” by GQ, Reggie Watts also regularly performs as the opening act for the popular Conan O’Brien TV show in the US. He also contributed two tracks to DFA Records’ Spaghetti Circus and performed with dance-punk band LCD Soundsystem. Reggie regularly performs at PS122 in NY.

Reggie’s first ever show in Berlin will be supported by the amazing mysterious witchcraft genius locally-brewed music performance project that will carefully prepare your mind and your body for Reggie’s psychedelic mental trip and then will blow off whatever it is that is remaining.Conan OBrienPopcommVideo

]]>http://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts-in-berlin/feed/0REGGIE WATTShttp://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts/
http://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts/#commentsThu, 29 Dec 2011 22:36:22 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6021Imagine you come to a show and realize midway through that you’re having a really strong trip. Reggie Watts’ intellectually stimulating hilariously clever improvised comedy beatbox performance does exactly this to the audiences.

In his stream-of-consciousness monologues combined with beautifully mastered beatbox interludes, Reggie shifts seamlessly between different personas, musical styles, accents, voices, and even – yes – bodies. He may be speaking in British cockney to explain how many Xanax he has taken, or as a ghetto youth with extensive knowledge of economic theory (“this world be fucking crazy, when you be looking at some virtualized numbers that symbolize shit that don’t exist”). Whoever witnesses this hilarious psychotic maze, goes through a succession of mental orgasms accompanied by endless fits of laughter.

Hailed as the “man of towering genius” by Brian Eno and the “comic genius” by GQ, Reggie Watts also regularly performs as the opening act for the popular Conan O’Brien TV show in the US. He also contributed two tracks to DFA Records’ Spaghetti Circus and performed with dance-punk band LCD Soundsystem. Reggie regularly performs at PS122 in NY.

]]>http://playberlin.com/2011/12/reggie-watts/feed/2Fountain / To the Mountainhttp://playberlin.com/2011/12/fountain-mountain-jeremy-wade/
http://playberlin.com/2011/12/fountain-mountain-jeremy-wade/#commentsThu, 15 Dec 2011 09:35:20 +0000deemeetreehttp://playberlin.com/?p=6009In “Fountain/To the Mountain”, the American choreographer Jeremy Wade creates a two-part performance that sends his audience on a physical trip. He amalgamates psychedelic and religious experiences into a grotesque spectacle in which the ordinary becomes fantastic. In this piece, Wade addresses the relationship of collective struggle and mutual support, working with kinetic and ritual sculptures as well as images taken from nature and the animal world. How can an audience’s physical empathy be increased? How can sharing an experience ease the effort?

Wade prepares the space with a collective warm-up exercise for the second part. In the trio of Florentina Holzinger, Ligia Manuela Lewis, and Rodrigo Sobarzo internal and external images collide. The performer’s bodies become the scene of shifting expressions and states of consciousness. Constraints and liberation, fear and relief result in poses that turn their bodies into an irritating picture puzzle of daily life. The bodies become blurry, transitory and associative, moving around in a hallucinatory vision of sounds, word fragments, and imaginary geometry.
“Fountain/To the Mountain” is the result of a six-month research period entitled “Identity & Transgression”. In an exchange with several artists, Wade explored different constellations, mechanisms, and visions of the body in dance.
The physical experience of the self, transforming body images and searching the shape of a group collective come together in “Fountain/To the Mountain” as a playful reflection on the role of the audience in theater. How can a contemporary understanding of empathy form the basis of a revision of the community?

Our goal is that by the end of the evening people come out from their little circles and groups and become one moving mass that is having a lot of fun. We feed you with magic fortune cookies, magic holy basil pills, magic vodka shots and many more magic things including glitter and air-borne movement viruses that spread through the power of deep disco beats.

This mix is a reinterpretation of the live set NOVOLINE aka Nat Munari performed at the reception of the wedding of two italian friends in the hills north of Verona, Italy, September 10th, 2011. This mix was distributed to the guests on printed CDs as a limited release along with a mix by M-U-S-I-C-C-I-T-Y blogger Xavier García Bardón.

This event is an experiment in movement contagion, where we are going to dance non-stop and let it spread through the whole crowd, place, area, city, country, continent, planet and ultimately the universe. We move and move other people who move us back and so on. You get the idea.

We will also serve magic fortune cookies, magic holy pills, magic glitter, magic vodka shots, and many more things. The music will be the finest selection of 360° dancefloor burning action.

After the success with HTRK and Bruises (thank you!) we return on December with more audio agGression and death defying bass. We are proud to present the warriors of the evening:

Ancient Methods – There’s a primal punch to the industrial techno sounds of Ancient Methods. Their records sounds like gigantic machines, made of flesh and wood and metal, is roaming across the land, devouring everything in site and spewing out angry funk at the other end. The result is a surprisingly subtle kick in the gut that we are dying to see live.https://www.facebook.com/ancientmethods1Sun Worship – For all the severity of the fast paced assault of Sun Worship, they also create a spacious and strangely pretty atmosphere with their music. For being a band that only have two songs on Bandcamp and a casette out, they combine brutality and beauty in a way that surpasses a lot of their more experienced colleagues – both in skill and energy. Neukoelln Black Metal, bring it on! http://sunworship.bandcamp.com/album/sun-worship

Hanno Hinkelbein – Hanno Hinkelbein is Berlin royalty and a long time scenester and techno hero with ties to classic venues like Tresor and Suicide Circus. With a wicked smile he’s been in the business of dishing out dirty pounding acid and evil bassed out beats, for longer than you’ve lived here. This evening we think he also might be exploring his love of Godflesh and messed up dubstep, but then again, who knows? http://www.myspace.com/nullrecordscirclePURGE – The PURGE Allstars BlackBlackGold, (GucciGoth) xorzyzt (BL4CK M4G1CK) and Tom Ass (Gegen) gives you their own brand of satanic dance floor incantations. BlackBlackGold gives his sickest bass heavy attack step. xorzyzt mixes sick drones with sicker beats. Tom Ass kicks the industrial shamanism. Nobody is safe. http://soundcloud.com/purge-berlin

dieLamb – Live visuals by our nasty video smear campaigner. Make sure to check out the PURGE II video flyer he directed with xorzyzt! http://dielamb.com/